


The Ones Who Walk from Miles City

by MoreRoads (SunlitDarkness)



Category: Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas - Ursula K. Le Guin, The Miseducation of Cameron Post - Emily M. Danforth
Genre: Internalized Homophobia, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Religious Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:34:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24246589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunlitDarkness/pseuds/MoreRoads
Summary: There are many possibilities for who Coley Taylor became.This explores some of them and introduces other possibilities.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 8





	The Ones Who Walk from Miles City

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize for my writing tenses being all over the place, but this is definitely what this work needs to be right now.

Once upon a time, Coley Taylor lived in Miles City with her mother and her brother. She found happiness in the eyes of the Lord and set about creating the life her church said she should live. Coley Taylor had a boyfriend and works the land and went to church on Sundays and all kinds of God-approved activities throughout the week. And Coley Taylor was happy.

One summer, her friend Cameron Post asked to tell her a secret, and the secret was “I’ve been in love with you since forever, Coley Taylor.” And Cameron Post kissed Coley, even though they were both girls. And Coley was confused and excited and so she continued on. And Coley Taylor kept her boyfriend and church and after school activities and worked the land with her hands and made out with Cameron Post and went to church on Sundays. And she enjoyed it.

Coley Taylor’s brother found out and she panicked. And her panic brought about many people knowing that the both of them had kissed other girls and had sex with other girls but what mattered was that it had been with each other. And through this, Coley became responsible for Cameron Post being sent away to a Christian Conversion School in the mountains.

And…

* * *

...Coley Taylor continued to live in MIles City and felt no guilt for what harm may come to Cameron at the school. She grieved and repented of her sins, of same sex attraction and pre-marital sex. Coley Taylor became and stayed a righteous Christian woman who married her high school boyfriend and had 2 children who also worked the land with their hands. And Coley’s mother and brother were content and rested. And Coley Taylor never thought of Cameron Post again.

* * *

...Coley Taylor felt guilt whenever she came across any memory of Cameron Post, and there were many all through Miles City. She couldn’t stay in the apartment that her mother had rented mostly for her use, and thus Coley and Mrs. Taylor never saw eye to eye again. Coley Taylor did not marry her high school boyfriend, but became pregnant later in life and vowed to raise her child to be okay. And Coley Taylor thought of Cameron Post every day, even after she had come to terms that she was not responsible for the reactions of Cameron’s aunt, uncle, and grandma.

* * *

...Coley Taylor lost track of Cameron Post after the hullabaloo of Cameron’s disappearance from God’s Promise. She worked on her own guilt and internalized homophobia. Coley went to Missoula for college and never returned to Miles City. She tried loving other women and other men, and it didn’t work. Coley sat in the bathroom and cried for hours after the first time she had sex with a man, and some part inside of her that had learned all through growing up that her only worth was in her virginity, broke and harmed her. And she worked on her own guilt and trauma and internalized sexism. And in this version of Coley Taylor, the specifics do not matter beyond that she continued to learn of her biases and prejudices and work on them throughout her life. She died a well rounded person who knew her flaws and had overcome uncountable hardships.

* * *

...Coley Taylor lost track of Cameron Post after the hullabaloo of Cameron’s disappearance from God’s Promise. She went to Missoula for college and never returned to Miles City. She lost her shit and had a breakdown after her first Christmas. Coley came out as a lesbian, and her mother screamed and cried but never disowned her. Coley met a girl in her 180 Biology class and fell hard in love. Coley Taylor married Hannah Lang because they understood each other and talked about religious trauma together. Hannah spoke of the Mormons and Coley frowned. Coley spoke of Gates of Praise and mentions off hand about Cameron getting sent to God’s Promise, and Hannah cries angry tears. Coley understands less about love now than she did then, but it feels kinder on her soul and she keeps it.

* * *

...Coley Taylor ran into Cameron Post again as a sophomore in college. Cameron stared at her really hard like she had something, many things, to say. She glared, and shoved Coley shoulders and asked why she had done that. Why she had told. Why Coley had abandoned her. Coley didn’t have an answer, and Cameron walked out of her life forever.

* * *

...Coley Taylor moved to Seattle and met Cameron Post again at a bar. And they laughed and Coley went back to Cameron’s apartment with her and it felt exactly like it had in Miles City when neither of them really talked about what kissing and making out would mean for the future, except that Coley Taylor wasn’t afraid of God or disappointing her father anymore. And afterwards, Cameron curled up into a very small ball and had a panic attack and Coley sat awkwardly on the edge of the bed until she finally leaves.  
Cameron calls her and they agree to become friends again.  
They are the best man at each other’s weddings.

* * *

...Coley Taylor dies in a freak car accident driving to Quake Lake.

* * *

* * *

Miles City is changing with and without the rest of the world. Cameron Post plays no part in it, but Coley Taylor does. She watches the gay movements on the coasts from afar with her husband and teenage daughter. She longs to join in, but the most she ever does is sign favorable petitions and fight with the Montana senators on the phone. And…

* * *

...Coley Taylor is satisfied. Through the rest of her life, Coley takes up other issues to hassle the senators about so that others may have more freedoms and rights and the overall discrimination in rural Montana might decrease.

* * *

...She doesn’t tell her husband about Cameron Post until 2015 when same-sex marriage is legalized, and she serves him divorce papers. She is a middle-aged woman at this point, but she finally feels capable of handling her sexuality crisis. She divorces her husband and learns to fit into the LGBTQ+ community. She is happy.

* * *

...Cameron Post comes and talks to her when they are 40. They talk a lot and they kiss once. And that is the end of their friendship.

* * *

...Coley hears very quickly that Cameron Post has returned to Miles City. She swoops in and hoists Irene Klauson high in a spinning embrace. She attends their wedding. They don’t quite get to talk, but there is happiness in both their faces. And Miles City benefits from having them both stay.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this [work on Tumblr](https://shedoesnotcomprehend.tumblr.com/post/169244532951/once-upon-a-time-there-was-a-city-called-omelas) about Ursula K Le Guin's short story


End file.
